Think you’re serious about digital photography? Would you hand over $450 and your $1500 digital SLR for an irreversible, warranty-voiding conversion to shoot only digital infrared photos? By that measure I’m a total piker, but photographer Michael Reichmann has taken the plunge. In describing the challenge of converting these files to black & white, he writes, “There is a Santa Claus after all. Adobe’s new Lightroom can do just what’s needed. The program has a very sophisticated monochrome conversion capability, and an even more sophisticated ‘Auto’ function built into it that optimizes tonal distribution during grayscale conversion.” Maybe this is a hint of things to come, as camera companies look farther beyond the megapixel arms race & towards features that open new creative possibilities (and without voiding your warranty, either). [Via]
There are some cameras sold for astrophotography that have the infra-red filter removed or modified to begin with. Cameras like the 20Da from Canon come to mind with a filter in front of the CCD modified to push the red portion of the filter out beyond 656nm which theoretically should allow more IR through.
I had this modification done to my Rebel XT. The results are wonderful and can’t be easily duplicated with computer techniques. I have an infrared gallery of some of my inital results and I am still continuing learning to use the modded camera. I also wait for Lightroom for Windows, hopefully making my IR workflow more straightforward.
Do like maxmax or lifepixel for conversion of a D 80 to infrared